Banning orders and criminal database to be introduced April 2018

New banning orders, which could see landlords barred from letting or managing a property indefinitely, will be introduced in April 6 next year it has been announced.

The Government said the move will go ahead subject to the regulations being approved by each House of Parliament, with debates expected to take place early in the New Year.

Plans to introduce banning orders were announced as part of the Housing and Planning Act 2016 to root out criminal landlords. A new database of criminal landlords and agents will also be created under the Act and will go live the same day.

Held by DCLG and updated by local authorities, landlords who receive banning orders will automatically be listed on the register.

The DCLG has now released details of the serious offences that will merit a banning order.

Housing offences

Illegally evicting or harassing a residential occupier in contravention of the Protection from Eviction Act 1977

Using violence to secure entry under the Criminal Law Act 1977

Any of the following offences under the Housing Act 2004:

Failure to comply with an Improvement Notice (section 30);

Failure to comply with a prohibition order (section 32)

Offences in relation to licensing of Houses in Multiple Occupation (HMOs) (section 72);

Offences in relation to licensing of houses under Part 3 of the Act (section 95);

Contravention of an overcrowding notice (Section 139)

Failure to comply with management regulations in respect of HMOs (section 234).

Providing false or misleading information (section 238)

Also

An offence under section 36 of the Gas Safety (Installation and Use) Regulations 1998;

An offence under section 32 of the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005

Immigration offences

Letting to someone disqualified from renting because of their immigration status, whether as a landlord or agent.

Serious criminal offences

Any offence listed in any of items 7 to 14 of the Schedule if:

(the offence was committed against or in collusion with a tenant occupying any housing (or another person occupying that housing with the tenant) or the offence was committed at or in relation to that housing;

(at the time the offence was committed, the offender was the residential landlord or property agent of that housing or an officer of a body corporate who was the residential landlord or property agent of that housing; and

the offender was sentenced for the offence in the Crown Court.

The offences listed in the schedule include:

a range of fraud offences under the Fraud Act 2006

any specified violent and sexual offence under Schedule 15 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003

Offences under the Misuse of Drugs Act

Concealing criminal property and related offences under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002

The government has already introduced civil penalties of up to £30,000 and extended rent repayment orders in a bid to tackle criminal landlords – moves also introduce under the Housing and Planning Act.

The RLA welcomed the principle of banning orders and the database of criminal landlords when they were announced and has long argued that those landlords who wilfully breach their legal obligations should face the consequences.

However, the association believes those landlords who find themselves subject to an order or included on the ‘rogue’ landlord database through a mistake that was unintentional, should have a formal route to be released from an order and from being listed on the database where appropriate.

Currently, only local authorities are proposed to have access to the rogue landlord register, and the RLA has also raised concerns the reputation of membership bodies for landlords and agents could be undermined if they are not able to check if new or existing members are on there.

The association submitted a response to a Government consultation on the plans stressing there must be a commitment from local authorities when it comes to enforcement.

The Government’s response to this consultation has not yet been published, but is expected imminently. Keep an eye on the RLA news pages for updates.

Guidance for local authorities on their new enforcement powers is also yet to be published.

Comments

"Immigration offences
Letting to someone disqualified from renting because of their immigration status"

So there's going to be a database of those disqualified from renting to correspond with the database of disqualified landlords? No? Hypocrisy then. Landlords, sometimes as individuals, are responsible for determining immigration status on top of criminal records but govt departments & councils need a special, taxpayer funded database to make their lives easier.

Reply to the comment left by dp1 Django at 04/12/2017 - 18:17Of course, in a perfect world, no landlord (nor anyone for that matter) would be a criminal -why does a conviction for offences under either the Misuse of Drugs or Criminal Damage Act merit a banning order…it appears they started to write the list and became frenzied into including anything and everything.

It's an interesting issue. Unscrupulous accredited members of national landlord associations could still be rogue landlords. Irrespective of agreeing to a code of practice, training and CPD etc. practices are not checked or enforced. The only landlord accreditation scheme that I am aware of that inspects and checks the landlords properties and mode of operandi is "Consider-Rate Ltd". So rather than Landlord Associations having access to the database, they put more effort into ensuring a credible accreditation scheme! For this to be plausible (additional cost & time), I would like to see far more appreciation for accreditation from Local and Government Authorities.

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